Gaddafi proposed, Putin rejected

Fri, Jan 01, 2016, 05:18 PM

There was a time when Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi had proposed to Russian President Vlaidmir Puntin to strengthen the bonds of friendship between Russia and Libya by a marriage between his second son with the Russian leader's daughter.

Putin, taken aback by the proposal, managed to say, `My daughter doesn't know your son at all.'

The mores of Libya and Russia maybe different, but in historic times marriage was a means to strengthen bonds of friendship since the times of Alexander the Great.

A few days after Gaddafi made the proposal, his bullet-riddled body was found in the streets of Tripoli. People were shocked that a tyrant like Gaddafi, who gave the jitters to the US, would die in such circumstances. In the event, his second son, Saiful Islam, is cooling his heels behind the bars in Jintan for the atrocities committed by the Gaddafis on the Libyan people.

The Gaddafi proposal and Putin's sidestepping have been recorded by Arabic author Mohammed Abdel Motalub Al Hounini, which was excerpted in `Al Arabia'.